


once, again

by mstigergun



Series: Inglorious [6]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-05
Updated: 2015-09-05
Packaged: 2018-04-19 04:41:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4733135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mstigergun/pseuds/mstigergun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Have I been moaning the wrong name for weeks?” Leonid asks, as soon as he draws to Basten’s side at the bar, where the mage is waiting patiently as Flissa wrangles another order of drinks for the table of mercenaries at the back.</i>
</p><p>In which Leonid stalwartly insists he wants his life to return to normal, but chooses self-indulgence over his better sense.</p><p>(This directly follows "Gladiolus," and precedes enviouspride's "Resolution.")</p>
            </blockquote>





	once, again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [enviouspride](https://archiveofourown.org/users/enviouspride/gifts).



**once, again**

*

“Have I been moaning the wrong name for weeks?” Leonid asks, as soon as he draws to Basten’s side at the bar, where the mage is waiting patiently as Flissa wrangles another order of drinks for the table of mercenaries at the back. The tavern is a roar of laughter and shouted insults over games of cards and dice gone horribly wrong. Or wonderfully right, depending on the perspective.

Basten tilts his head, eyebrows raised. “No? Why – been thinking a great deal about moaning my name?”

Leonid scoffs, though that isn’t precisely _wrong_. He may have turned his thoughts to a few of his better memories from their trip while waiting for Sera to _shut up and deal the cards already_. Pathetic, really, when he ought to have been focused on making some _new_ memories with someone far less familiar.

Back to normal, he’d thought as they trudged their way back to Haven. Back to the familiar _unfamiliarity_ of his lovers. Certainly back to sleeping alone, which would infinitely better than resting his chin on the curve of a broad shoulder, or minding where his head was in relation to horns, or –

Any of it. All of it. Back to _normal_.

Normal, however, has become – slightly elusive. As if he returns to a familiar dance, only to find he’s forgotten all the right steps.

“It’s just that they’ve been calling you _Bastian_ ,” Leonid continues, with a jerk of his head toward the boisterous table where Basten settled after Leonid collected the drink he’d been promised and then peeled off to play cards with Sera and Eloise.

Not that Leonid’s been listening to the conversation at Basten’s table, of course. Not that he’s been staring across the empty space between their tables, lit by the flickering candles above and the uneven light of the fire crackling away in the hearth, and watching Basten’s broad back.

Of course not.

“And,” Leonid continues, leaning over the sticky bar to refill his own mug while Flissa struggles to balance the collection of mismatched steins on a tray far too narrow for the task, “Maker help me if I’ve been fucking a Qunari named Sebastian. Bad enough to have slept with one nearly-Orlesian man in this village. A Qunari with a poncy name who’s secretly from, I don’t know, _Val Chevin_? I don’t know if I’d ever recover. I hate Orlesians; I’m a Marcher, so I’m obliged.” A scowl flashes over his features: he can’t quite reach the tap, so he pushes himself up on his toes, leveraging himself against the bar. No doubt it’s this high in the front to keep people from doing precisely this, but he’ll be damned if he has to wait another moment for a refill. He went _weeks_ without in the woods; his first night back should see him with a mug that is never empty.

Basten reaches out and plucks the mug from Leonid’s hands, easily maneuvering it into place beneath the tap as Leonid withdraws, glad to have someone else taken over the task. “Thankfully,” Basten says, broad hands holding the stein steady as it fills up with the tavern’s watery excuse for ale, “I’m not Orlesian. Thankfully for _you_ , I mean. Since we’re talking about a thing that’s firmly in the past. It doesn’t matter either way moving forward.” He pushes the mug back at Leonid with a crooked smile. “No, it’s my nickname. Which I _did_ tell you when we met.”

Someone else might look offended. Basten, on the other hand, is nothing but _amused_ , the skin around his eyes crinkling and his familiar smile firmly in place.

Leonid blinks at him. “You did?” At the nod in response, he huffs, because, Maker be damned, he doesn’t recall that in the slightest. What he _does_ recall is staring up into a pair of brilliantly blue eyes and thinking that, though he had weeks in the woods ahead of him, at least he would find his company – adequate recompense. “Well, I was distracted.”

“By _what_?” Although by the way those same eyes glint, he knows precisely what had distracted Leonid.

“Oh, _things_ ,” Leonid sighs. “Things you would no doubt find very complimentary, so I’ll keep them to myself. But _Bastian_. Quite the nickname,” Leonid finishes, taking a swallow of his ale. Foul, but familiar at least – the _right_ sort of familiar. And effective, which is rather more important still.

“With an _o_ , not an _a_.” Basten again reaches out, plucking two of the mugs from Flissa’s crowded tray, which wins him a small smile as she hefts the rest up and starts to weave her way over to the table where a collection of Basten’s company are loudly recounting stories from their latest adventure in the wilds.

Already Basten has turned, ready to follow her over but –

Leonid reaches out and catches his elbow, warm even through the thin fabric of his tunic, which is fresh and clean and has decidedly _not_ been on the road with them for weeks. It’s also soft beneath his fingertips. “So,” Leonid says, “bastion – as in, _he who protects and upholds_?”

A chuckle, Basten shrugging as he glances away, though he doesn’t move out from underneath Leonid’s light touch. “Something like that.”

“How _disgusting_ ,” Leonid says, even though he finds himself grinning around the syllables, involuntary. Which is rude of his face, really, to do something like that without his explicit permission – but then he’s had enough to drink that he can’t even be cross with himself for very long.

Basten looks at him, a crooked smile curling his mouth. “Spend much time at our table and you’ll end up with one of your own,” he says.

“One of my own,” says Leonid. “A nickname or a _bastion_?”

Again, Basten shrugs, non-committal. There’s an offer in there, one that’s far more tempting than it ought to be. Leonid shouldn’t _want_ to spend another moment with this man, who he’s just spent weeks with – indeed, he should be hungry for someone entirely new, someone _unfamiliar_ because _that_ is Leonid’s normal. Instead of flitting his way through the tavern and finding a likely prospect, however, Leonid had downed more ale than was strictly comfortable the moment he saw Basten stand up to get another round, just so that he could chase him to the bar and ask him about his name.

Pathetic. Not that he hasn’t used that tactic before – Maker knows it’s a favourite in his arsenal – but he shouldn’t have felt _compelled_ to. Shouldn’t have wanted to have Basten to himself for just a moment. To feel Basten towering over him, body a warm presence by his side.

Leonid glances through the crowded room to the seat he just left, where Sera is halfway through another pint and a third round of whatever the card game they’ve been playing is with Eloise, who looks distantly amused by whatever Sera has just said. If he peers more fixedly still, he can see Sacha sitting in the farthest corner – the one that would be quietest, so that he stands a chance of hearing his mage as he goes on about the Imperium or hair product or whatever it is he might be saying that has Sacha looking so _attentive_. So very _rapt_. An attention that breaks only for a moment as Sacha’s gaze flicks up and meets Leonid’s across the tavern.

Irritation buzzes beneath his skin. He turns back to Basten, hand still firmly in place against his arm. “Or,” he says, “you could come play cards with me. Sera’s been trying to teach us this game that may or may not be entirely invented on the spot.”

Basten blinks down at him, his eyes that _ridiculous_ and _impossible_ blue. “Funny,” he says, “I could have sworn you said earlier that I wasn’t allowed to talk to you for at least a week.”

“I didn’t say _I_ couldn’t start a conversation. Or invite you to lose at cards.”

“Oh, you think I’ll _lose_ ,” Basten says, grin still in place. “I don’t want to wound your ego any further. I might blink and find another arrow –”

“ _You_ bought _me_ the drink, thereby admitting guilt in the whole fiasco,” Leonid says, rolling his eyes. “Besides, you wear scars well. Now if _I’d_ been hit, it would have been a sin against the Maker himself, as I wear _perfectly unmarred_ well.” His fingers still rest against the shape of Basten’s elbow, which he realizes belatedly – the awareness like the prick of a needle against his skin, enough to startle. How long has Leonid been _touching_ him?

 _Too long_ is how long. His hand drops away, and Leonid huffs out a little laugh. Meant to distract from the suddenness of the gesture, the spike of something like _panic_ written in the movement, although of course Basten’s eyebrows inch higher on his forehead. He _would_ notice, the wretch.

“Never mind me,” Leonid offers, taking another long swallow of the ale, which is just warm enough to bring out all its fouler flavours. “The pickings are slim tonight. I may be getting desperate.”

Basten nods, as if this is sensible. “Right,” he says.

It’s a conversation he would very much like to be over, so Leonid shoots Basten a charming smile in farewell and heads off, slipping through the crowd and settling heavily back into his own chair.

“Makes you wonder,” Sera says, eyes glittering as she smirks at Leonid.

“Wonder _what_ ,” he says. Eloise flicks out cards neatly in front of him, which he gathers up after he takes another deep drink from his mug.

“How you’re _walking_ straight! All alone with _that_ and _you_ being _you_ , pants off as soon as someone half-decent looks at you.” A pause, as Leonid glares at her over the tops of his cards – which are, truth be told, shit, so it looks like his losing will continue apace. “And he’s more than _half_ -decent. All big and tall and freckles. And _horns_.”

Heat prickles up the back of Leonid’s neck. “Practice,” he says finally, attention flicking up only for the length of a breath as Basten moves past their table to join his company again. “Lots and lots of practice is how I’m walking straight, Sera.”

Eloise rolls her eyes. “Charming as always,” she says, setting down her first card, which distracts Sera for a moment as she swears and shuffles her cards around before settling on one to slap on top of Eloise’s. Leonid chooses a card at random, still entirely unsure of how the game works and not, in truth, bothered by losing, and tosses it onto the table.

A dry laugh, Eloise shaking her head. “Perhaps if you practiced _winning_?”

“That’d be all the fun gone,” Sera supplies, shoving the cards at Leonid – which means, he thinks, he has to pick them up. “Seeing him _sulk_.”

Eloise starts another round, tilting her head as she examines her cards. “That’s hardly why he’s sulking. Cousin Leonid only sulks when he hasn’t ended up with precisely what he wants. Isn’t that right?” The corners of her mouth curl up in the smallest, most _superior_ little smile – one that immediately makes Leonid scowl in response.

“I’m not _sulking_ ,” Leonid says, finishing his drink and slamming the mug down on the tacky surface. “And if I _were_ , it would because this game is stupid. And because I’m here with the two of _you_ instead of pressed up against some wall by a soldier.” He again drops another random card onto the pile, reaching out to collect the stack before Sera can make him pick up this hand as well.

Sera cackles, delighted – though if it’s at his continued losing streak or his insistence that he isn’t _sulking_ , Leonid doesn’t know.

They play another few hands in relative silence, though of course the tavern still buzzes around them, filled with too-loud conversations and the bard’s attempt to play over the whole thing. Several times, he glances over at Basten, then rushing to play whatever card he guesses might do the trick – except that it never does. Indeed, he begins to think the whole thing a conspiracy and says as much, though Eloise only rolls her eyes. “Paying attention might help.”

“I _am_ ,” he insists.

“You’re a liar,” Sera says. “Still _sulking_.” She jerks her chin toward the table where Basten’s sitting. “ _You’d_ like to keep practicing,” chased with an indignant laugh that’s more snort than anything else.

Leonid scoffs, although he feels the flush spread across his cheeks. To be so _obvious_. “You – I don’t _sulk._ And I certainly don’t sulk over men I’ve already _had.”_

“Dunno,” says Sera. “The face _was_ there, and now it’s not. And you’re not making it at anyone else. Just gone, yeah? And then sulking.”

“ _The face_. What face? I only have this one,” says Leonid, too warm and not nearly drunk enough for this. “And it’s perfect all of the time.” His fingers drum against the top of the table, waiting for more cards, although Eloise has stopped shuffling and instead looks over at Basten’s back, eyes bright with interest.

“The _hungry_ face, you stupid face,” Sera says. “All the leaning in and the touching. Means you’ve found your bed warmer. Means you’ll keep your neighbours up – _again.”_

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Leonid leans back in his seat, pointedly _not_ looking toward the mercenary table or the familiar broad shoulders that would be shaking with the laugh he can hear breaking free of Basten’s throat.

“She’s quite right,” Eloise says lightly. She takes up shuffling again, a delicate and practiced gesture. Graceful. “Though the question remains why there’s any need to be sulking when it’s clear you could have precisely what you’re after tonight. Restraint is so unlike you, Leonid. Where _has_ your self-indulgence gone?”

Leonid huffs, picking up his empty mug. “It’s in the bottom of a keg, is where it’s gone, and so my _self-indulgence_ demands that I keep drinking.” And, like that, he’s up and across the room again. Best to drown the flush that’s managed to heat his face, he thinks resolutely. And then he’ll head back to bed, weary from the road and thoroughly uninterested in those who’ve made their way to the tavern tonight. Already, Dorian and Sacha have headed out, no doubt searching for a more quiet space as the drinking’s made the atmosphere in the tavern a dull roar.

Leonid draws up to the bar, waiting as Flissa gathers empty mugs left scattered about the room and wends her way back toward the counter. He supposes that, despite his wish to salvage his reputation, there are other things slightly more pressing: namely, his bed. And the early morning meeting he has with Ambassador Montilyet. A meeting he’ll attend alongside Basten, who can speak rather more knowledgeably on the cultists than Leonid, whose observations on the whole affair can be neatly summarized with _I don’t know, there was a great deal of hand-waving and the mumbling of gibberish_.

Flissa sets down the collection of mugs, wiping her hands on her apron. She stares pointedly at Leonid as she pours his ale. “Patience next time,” she says when finally she shoves his mug back at him.

Leonid opens his mouth, ready to respond that a man who’s been away for weeks doing the Herald’s bidding shouldn’t _need_ patience when it comes to being plied with drink, when a steady weight settles on his shoulder. “That’s my fault,” Basten supplies, with a sly grin shot at Leonid. “I threw an entire round at you at once. Which I’ll be doing again, I’m afraid.”

“So _demanding,”_ Leonid intones, blinking up at Basten. He takes a long drink from the stein Flissa has placed before him.

Basten’s steady gaze meets his own, bright with amusement. “So,” he says as Flissa passes him a filled stein to replace the empty one he’s set on the counter. “Did you lose?”

“Wretchedly,” sighs Leonid. “Horribly. A humiliating defeat, the likes of which I will never live down.”

“You ready to lose again? I might join you this time.” Basten takes a sip of his ale, though his attention doesn’t slip from Leonid. His smile firmly in place, his gaze – attentive, yes, but relaxed. Another offer, one that comes with nothing like _obligation_ or _expectation._

It’s a stare that makes something – _flutter_ inside of him. A foolish and weak thing, his reaction.

 _Where has your self-indulgence gone?_ Eloise had intoned. A man who’s finished a rather long and sometimes tricky mission for the Herald is due some measure of self-indulgence, Leonid thinks resolutely. Surely, that.

“You know,” he says finally, leaning in a little closer despite himself – though Leonid can now only imagine Sera’s eyes on his back, her delighted little cackle at his predictability. “I had been thinking of retiring for the evening, as we’ve that meeting with the Ambassador in the morning – and you _know_ she’ll have something to say if I show up hung-over. She’ll pretty up her words, but, if I have to be up before noon, the last thing I need is a disappointed Montilyet. Believe me: my family’s had dealings with them for _years,_ and when they get cross, they get _sneaky._ And I’ve no desire for my next mission to be to some backwater town in a bog where the local _lord_ is related to every single man, woman, and child within a two day ride.”

Something flashes across Basten’s features, but it’s gone as quickly as a flicker of lightning on the horizon. In its place, his steady smile. “To bed already, and alone? And I’d just finished telling my company that I’d spent the past few weeks in the woods with an _untameable_ spitfire.”

“You said that? To your company?” asks Leonid, laughing. Heat again warms the base of his neck, the skin of his cheeks. “How _sweet.”_

“I know how you worry for your reputation. And they’ve got big mouths.”

“Well, at the cost of seeing it fall further – though I am relying, at this point, on a full tavern well-supplied with ale to divert attention – I thought –” Leonid stops. Shifts his weight, his hand finding the small of Basten’s back. “Our meeting is early indeed, and your company camps all the way beyond the main gates. I’m quartered just outside the Chantry. You might join me. For efficiency.”

Basten laughs, the surprise making the sound light even in the noise of the tavern. _“Efficiency._ And that would see you break your rules?”

Leonid knows better. Still, _“Once.”_ Said with a resolve he does not entirely believe, but it will have to suffice. He can allow himself this much self-indulgence.

“Right,” says Basten, smile crooked and entirely too dashing. “Once. _Again.”_

Leonid could be irritated, but it's impossible when he’s on the receiving end of _that_ look – all slow heat and easy confidence. “Did you _want_ me to change my mind?” asks Leonid.

“No,” Basten says, a firm syllable, though it’s still gilded with the echo of laughter. “Anything for efficiency, after all.” He tips back his mug, draining it of the ale that remains, and Leonid follows suit. The room hums with conversation, muffled music, roars of laughter, and Leonid’s skin tingles with anticipated heat, with the weight of Basten’s body against his.

He ducks out the side door of the tavern, Basten close on his heels, and they make their way up the snowy path toward Leonid’s quarters.

“I do mean it, though,” Leonid says when finally they’ve made their way out of the cold, Basten’s hands familiar shapes against his skin, his breath ghosting the shape of Leonid’s ear. Leonid’s fingers are tangled in the front of Basten’s clothes, tugging him closer and closer still, his own eyes already half-lidded with heat.

“Mean what?” Basten murmurs the spare syllables against Leonid’s skin, hot.

A little shiver works its way down Leonid’s spine. He leans back, staring up at Basten as his blood thrums through his veins, made bright with _want._ With self-indulgence, though it’s a self-indulgence far more dangerous than Leonid’s usual fare. That the danger makes it all the more alluring –

“Once,” he says. “That’s all.”

If he repeats it more for himself than for Basten, so be it.

Basten makes a low sound in his throat, an agreement. “Whatever you say.”

 _Efficiency,_ Leonid thinks as Basten pushes him back against the closed door, mouth again pressed against Leonid’s as Leonid stretches and catches one of his horns in his palm. And _indulgence_ and perhaps, at the very back of his mind, _comfort._ Maybe even that.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Followed in this little series by enviouspride's ["Resolution."](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Inglorious/works/4681790)
> 
> And I once again stole [weyrbound's](http://weyrbound.tumblr.com) characters, Sacha and Eloise Trevelyan. Whoops!


End file.
